An SEC receiver appointed to preserve assets of the defunct Platinum Partners funds claims that the manager, Mark Nordlicht, of New Rochelle, owes the funds $220 million.
Melanie L. Cyganowski sued Nordlicht Dec. 7 in U.S. Bankruptcy Court, White Plains, to stop him from using bankruptcy to get out of paying back creditors.
Nordlicht omitted information and made false statements in bankruptcy documents, the complaint states, as “part of a fraudulent scheme by the debtor to conceal estate assets from the Chapter 7 trustee and his creditors.”
Nordlicht”™s bankruptcy attorneys did not respond to a message asking for their client”™s side of the story.
Nordlicht co-founded Platinum Partners in 2003, and at one point managed $1.7 billion in assets. But by 2016, the funds were nearly insolvent.
The federal prosecutor in Brooklyn indicted him for securities fraud and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filed civil charges. Both cases are pending.
Cyganowski was appointed to marshal assets of several Platinum funds, on behalf of the SEC.
This past June, Nordlicht petitioned for Chapter 7 liquidation, declaring assets of $137,052 and liabilities of more than $206 million.
But according to the Cyganowski complaint, Nordlicht should not be allowed to use bankruptcy to discharge debt because he engaged in a “long-running pattern of fraudulent conduct, by filing false schedules, lying under oath and knowingly deceiving the Chapter 7 trustee.”
A bankruptcy schedule, for instance, shows that Nordlicht and his wife, Dahlia Kalter, receive $25,000 a month from his mother for tuition and other expenses. But Nordlicht”™s mother actually wrote them one check, according to the complaint, for $1.4 million.
Nordlicht allegedly did not disclose ownership of a luxury condominium on Manhattan”™s Upper West Side or the use of shell companies to conceal assets, as “part of a larger scheme to frustrate a recovery by his creditors in this bankruptcy.”
Cyganowski links the alleged bankruptcy misinformation to Nordlicht”™s management of the Platinum funds.
He overvalued fund assets, according to the complaint, “to extract significant management and incentive fees for his own personal enrichment and that of Platinum Fund insiders ”“ most of them friends and family of the debtor ”“ at the expense of the Platinum Funds and their investors and creditors.”
Thirteen creditors have filed bankruptcy claims against Nordlicht for $986 million, including Cyganowski”™s claim for “not less than $219.8 million.”
Cyganowski is represented by Manhattan attorneys Erik B. Weinick, Jennifer S. Feeney and William M. Moran.
Manhattan attorneys Mark A. Frankel and Scott Krinsky represent Nordlicht in his bankruptcy case.
